Using an advanced speech-recognition/voice response chip, an electronic memory, and facial motors, Amazing Amanda, scheduled for release next month by Playmates Toys, will “listen, speak and show emotion,” with responses customized to the individual child.
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A Dose Of Genius
June 12, 2006
The use of “smart pills” that increase concentration, focus, wakefulness and short-term memory is soaring.
A Dream Interpretation: Tuneups for the Brain
November 11, 2009
Dr. J. Allan Hobson, a psychiatrist and sleep researcher at Harvard, argues that dreaming is a parallel state of consciousness that is continually running but normally suppressed during waking. This is supported by research on lucid dreaming, which has been found to have elements of both rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep and of waking.
Hobson argues that the main function of REM, when most dreaming occurs, is physiological: the brain is… read more
A Drug-Dispensing Lens
May 22, 2009
Eyenovations has developed contact lenses that can deliver drugs to the eye for a month or more, using a hydrogel lens with a polymer film inside that contains the medication.
Uses include delivery of medicine without relying on frequent eyedrops for patients with glaucoma and for delivering antibiotics following eye surgery.
A Face-Finding Search Engine
September 18, 2008
Carnegie Mellon University researchers are developing software that could identify a person’s face in a low-resolution video and could be used to identify criminals or missing persons, or could be integrated into next-generation video search engines.
A Fast and Simple Cocaine Detector
March 13, 2006
UCSB researchers have created sensors using specific DNA sequences, combined with off-the-shelf components, that can detect cocaine in the blood and other substances.
The sensor consists of a gold electrode covered in specific strands of DNA. When the target molecule, in this case cocaine, binds to the DNA, it changes conformation. That change increases current flow through the electrode, creating a measurable electronic signal that can be read by… read more
A Fast, Programmable Molecular Clock
October 31, 2008
UC San Diego bioengineers have created the first stable, fast, and programmable genetic clock that reliably keeps time by the blinking of fluorescent proteins inside E. coli cells.
To create the clock, UC San Diego scientists genetically engineered a molecular oscillator composed of multiple gene promoters, which turn genes on in the presence of certain chemicals, and genes themselves, one of which codes for a fluorescent protein.… read more
A Fast, Sensitive Virus Detector
January 10, 2007
A sensor that measures the concentration of viruses in minutes could make possible a handheld device that cheaply and quickly spots pathogens.
A Faster Way to Detect Heart Attacks
May 13, 2008
University of Texas at Austin researchers are testing a “nano-biochip” made of silicon that could detect heart attacks based on the proteins found in a patient’s saliva.
The dime-sized chip, read in a toaster-sized analyzer, could be used concurrently with EKGs in ambulances.
Heart attacks are currently diagnosed by biomarkers in the blood and electrocardiograms. EKGs miss a large number of heart attacks, particularly those with lesser or… read more
A faster, higher-quality way to reprogram cells into stem cells
October 12, 2011
Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute researchers have announced a new technique to reprogram human cells, such as skin cells, into stem cells.
The researchers said their process increases the efficiency of cell reprogramming 100-fold and generates cells of a higher quality at a faster rate.
Until now, cells have been reprogrammed using four specific regulatory proteins. By adding two further regulatory factors —… read more
A fat tummy shrivels your brain
January 10, 2011
Obese individuals had more water in the amygdala, a part of the brain involved in eating behavior, Antonio Convit at the New York University School of Medicine found in an fMRI study. He also saw smaller orbitofrontal cortices in obese individuals, important for impulse control and also involved in feeding behavior .
“It could mean that there are less neurons, or that those neurons are shrunken,” says… read more
A Few Good Toys
December 4, 2002
The Army’s goal is to come up with a uniform by 2008 with helmet that enhances hearing and protect ears from battle cacaphony and heads-up display built into the visor to display infrared images. A wheeled robot “mule” would follow a soldier around with equipment for purifying water and recharging batteries.
The Army warfighter of 2025 will have lightweight body armor made with nanomaterials to deflect a bullet with… read more
A Few of Our Favorite Things: ScienceNOW’s top stories of 2007
January 3, 2008
Arguments that black holes do not exist and quantum mechanics research that finds an observer can change the behavior of light, even after it has been measured, are two of Science Now’s top stories of 2007.
A Few Ways to Win Mortality War
November 21, 2002
Wired reports on Alcor’s Extreme Life Extension Conference.
A fiber-optic method of arresting epileptic seizures
February 5, 2013
UC Irvine neuroscientists have developed a way to stop epileptic seizures with fiber-optic light signals, heralding a novel opportunity to treat the most severe manifestations of the brain disorder.
Using a mouse model of temporal lobe epilepsy, Ivan Soltesz, Chancellor’s Professor and chair of anatomy & neurobiology, and colleagues created an EEG-based brain-waves-sensing) computer system that lights up hair-thin fiber optic… read more